# "Waterworld" discovered 40 LY away **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 22, 2012, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580 "2012-02-22T01:54:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/1 "2012-02-22T01:54:38Z")
Now, it’s not exactly Earthlike . . . [_The Telegraph_](http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/us-discovers-new-waterworld-planet-gj1214b/story-e6freuyi-1226277938834) reports: > [@](#): > > Researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics said they have identified an entirely new kind of planet, dominated not by rock, gas or other common materials, but water. > > The planet is “a waterworld enshrouded by a thick, steamy atmosphere”, they said in a statement, after scrutinising the planet with NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. > > “GJ1214b is like no planet we know of,” astronomer Zachary Berta said. “A huge fraction of its mass is made up of water.” > > GJ1214b was discovered in 2009 by the ground-based MEarth Project. Described as a “super-Earth”, it is about 2.7 times Earth’s diameter and weighs almost seven times as much. > > Further studies in 2010 led to scientists suspecting that the planet, where the temperature is some 232 Celsius, was largely covered in water. This was confirmed by Mr Berta and his co-authors using Hubble to study the planet when it crossed in front of its host star. Still . . . if there’s water . . . If we assume water is essential to life . . . What life-forms could live in hot water under high gravity? Anybody better at xenobiology than I care to speculate? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Lukeinva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lukeinva/32/17872_2.png) [@Lukeinva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lukeinva)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/2 "2012-02-22T02:04:23Z")
Panned I know… but imo the movie was somewhat brilliant science fiction. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/3 "2012-02-22T02:18:23Z")
It’s a world of Crawfish people. Self boiling, even. I move we call the planet [Zatarains](http://www.zatarains.com/). ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/4 "2012-02-22T03:02:23Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Still . . . if there’s water . . . If we assume water is essential to life . . . What life-forms could live in hot water under high gravity? Probably critters similar to what lives near to deep sea vents on Earth. If the world-ocean is hugely deep however then it may be largely sterile since there will be little source of nutrients for anything near the surface. If the seabed is a hundred or a thousand miles down and there’s no land to erode minerals into the ocean, all the minerals needed for life will be far away from the sunlight at the surface. ---
**Author:** ![Teufelblitz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@Teufelblitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teufelblitz)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/5 "2012-02-22T11:19:23Z")
Crab people! Crab People! Look like crabs, talk like people! ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/6 "2012-02-22T13:59:23Z")
Gizmodo managed to completely mangle the science on this, saying that “most” of the planet was water, when the original article only claimed “significantly more than Earth” (which is at 0.02% water). What would happen to a planet that was actually 50%+ water? Would the oxygen and hydrogen combust once subjected to a planet’s worth of gravity? ---
**Author:** ![MN\_Maenad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e95f7d/32.png) [@MN\_Maenad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MN_Maenad)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/7 "2012-02-22T14:06:23Z")
It’s Yuggoth! ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/8 "2012-02-22T14:36:36Z")
If the temp is 232 °C, wouldn’t it be Steamworld, not Waterworld? Or is the gravity sufficient to keep the water liquid at that temp? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/9 "2012-02-22T15:01:09Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > If the temp is 232 °C, wouldn’t it be Steamworld, not Waterworld? Or is the gravity sufficient to keep the water liquid at that temp? Not only that, apparently the gravity is sufficient to produce something called “hot ice.” ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/10 "2012-02-22T15:02:13Z")
I would imagine the sea life would be similar to what exists at the bottom of the sea and/or around hydrothermal vents, where a large variety of creatures exist under extremely high pressures and heat, conditions under which life would seemingly be impossible. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/11 "2012-02-22T15:57:14Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > What would happen to a planet that was actually 50%+ water? Would the oxygen and hydrogen combust once subjected to a planet’s worth of gravity? No. Water is hydrogen “ash” already. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/12 "2012-02-22T16:07:31Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > Gizmodo managed to completely mangle the science on this, saying that “most” of the planet was water, when the original article only claimed “significantly more than Earth” (which is at 0.02% water). > > What would happen to a planet that was actually 50%+ water? Would the oxygen and hydrogen combust once subjected to a planet’s worth of gravity? If “planet’s worth” was enough mass, it would create nuclear fusion (like any large mass). Otherwise I suppose it would be more like a gas giant like Uranus or Neptune. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/13 "2012-02-22T19:04:40Z")
Somebody send that article to Kevin Costner! ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/14 "2012-02-22T21:02:08Z")
You could hard-boil a heck of a lot of eggs on GJ1214b. ---
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/15 "2012-02-22T22:15:14Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > It’s a world of Crawfish people. Self boiling, even. I move we call the planet [Zatarains](http://www.zatarains.com/). Need an Alien? Why not try Zoidberg! ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/16 "2012-02-22T22:20:18Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Anybody better at xenobiology than I care to speculate? 🙂 Well… it depends. They’d probably start out as extremophiles, sure. But after 1 million years? 100 million years? 1 billion years? The real answer is that we really don’t know. We’re in a puddle that happened to conform to the hole that it was poured into, we have no idea what shape other puddles will be in, and we won’t know much until xenobiology is an actual science rather than a WAG’ing game. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/17 "2012-02-22T23:08:00Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > The real answer is that we really don’t know. _sigh_ Well, I guess we’ll just have to go and find out. Invent an FTL drive, somebody. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/18 "2012-02-22T23:25:24Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > _sigh_ Well, I guess we’ll just have to go and find out. Invent an FTL drive, somebody. Sorry, I built one in the garage, but the Test Pilot I selected has been away from the board for a while. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/19 "2012-02-22T23:34:35Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > If the temp is 232 °C, wouldn’t it be Steamworld, not Waterworld? Or is the gravity sufficient to keep the water liquid at that temp? At those temperatures and pressures, water on[GJ 1214 b](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GJ_1214_b) can be lots of cool stuff: > [@](#): > > Because of the varying pressure at depth, models of a water world include “steam, liquid, superfluid, high-pressure ices, and plasma phases” of water. Some of the solid-phase water could be in the form of ice VII. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2012, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580/20 "2012-02-22T23:37:39Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Not only that, apparently the gravity is sufficient to produce something called “hot ice.” Is there also [wondrous strange snow](http://www.opensourceshakespeare.com/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=midsummer&Act=5&Scene=1&Scope=scene&LineHighlight=1878#1878)? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/waterworld-discovered-40-ly-away/613580.md?page=2)